Dragons, drama, and tour-de-force monologues highlight Théâtre la Seizième’s 2026–27 season
The local French-language theatre company will present everything from a live video game to an emotionally intense two-hander based on a Virginia Woolf masterpiece
Lumières, Lumières, Lumières
THÉÂTRE LA SEIZIÈME ANNOUNCED details of its 2026–27 season today, and if there’s an overarching theme, it’s adaptation. This can be taken literally—one of the shows on the local French-language theatre company’s slate is a loose adaptation of a Virginia Woolf novel, while one of the characters in another is working on an adaptation of a classic French play. In one of the other productions, mythological creatures must adapt to a new life in unfamiliar bodies.
Here’s what’s on tap for the coming season. Unless otherwise noted, performances take place at Studio 16 and are in French with English surtitles.
In Lumières, Lumières, Lumières (October 14 to 18), two women share a summer residence in post-Victorian England. On the surface, they couldn’t be more different—Mrs. Ramsay is a traditional wife and mother while fiercely independent Lily dreams of the artist’s life—but the two share a bond forged by the passage of time and the ravages of war. In this coproduction of Comédie-Française (Paris) and Les Songes turbulents (Montreal), Florent Siaud directs Evelyne de la Chenelière’s play based loosely on Virginia Woolf’s masterpiece To the Lighthouse.
La Seizième starts the new year with Bonnes Bonnes (January 13 to 17, with performances alternating between French and English), presented with Vancouver Asian Canadian Theatre and Touchstone Theatre. In Sophie Gee and Tamara Nguyen’s play, three Chinese Canadian women reflect on their feelings of ambivalence toward the West. While making a chili sauce, the three touch on identity and class struggle—themes Jean Genet tackled in his 1947 play The Maids, which one of the women is adapting into an intersectional film.
Bonnes Bonnes
At The Dance Centre from March 4 to 6, Évelyne Rompré performs British playwright Alistair McDowall’s monologue All of It, translated as Tout ça by Fanny Britt and directed by Louis-Karl Tremblay. McDowall’s text transforms all of the tiny, ordinary moments that make up an individual’s life into something monumental. This is familiar material for Rompré, and her past performances have been hailed as breathtaking and masterful.
In Dragons (April 10), two of the titular creatures suddenly find themselves transformed into ordinary teenagers and must adjust to their awkward new bodies on their epic quest to return to their original form. Part theatrical presentation and part live video game, Dragons is a coproduction with STUDIO FUNFUG, Green Thumb Theatre, and Ottawa’s Théâtre français du Centre national des arts.
The emotionally intense psychological thriller Dilemme (May 5 to 15) is about a social worker who has been working the night shift answering calls at a suicide-prevention centre since her own daughter’s death. She finds the lines between her work and her personal life starting to blur in this drama inspired by the real-life stories of volunteers at a crisis hotline.
Théâtre la Seizième’s season also includes two shows aimed at younger audiences. For kids aged one to four years, Roadtrip (December 10 to 13) is an immersive journey using performance, sound design, and video; and for ages six and up, Le Criard (June 5) is a a cathartic musical produced by L’UniThéâtre (Edmonton) and Théâtre du Gros Mécano (Quebec) and performed in French with no surtitles.
For more information on any of these performances, see the Théâtre la Seizième website. 
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